OTTAWA — Veteran New Democrat MP Nathan Cullen is shrugging off the fact Jagmeet Singh is in no hurry to sit in the House of Commons, choosing to endorse the member of the Ontario legislature in his bid to lead the federal NDP.

Cullen, who himself ran against Mulcair in 2012, said Wednesday he is confident the NDP’s current team of MPs — 44 all told, including three running against Singh — can hold the Liberal government to account until 2019, if necessary.

While Singh has said he’d be inclined to wait until then to run in the...

The knives do seem to be out for Singh today. Mulcair was muttering dark things about the new leader not having a seat in Parliament. Cullen responded that it doesn't matter.

The issue of the leader being a Sikh is being exploited in Quebec, so they say. Such an exquisite way to avoid charges of racism. "Not that there's anything wrong with Sikhs ... but ... it'll cost us seats in Quebec."

I think the real issue is more likely the fact that he speaks French like an Ontarian from Brampton. But so does Angus.

I think the real issue is more likely the fact that he speaks French like an Ontarian from Brampton. But so does Angus.

Yeah, but they are cooked in Quebec anyway.
As I noted above they fell backwards into eight seats and losing Mulcair is the ninth, now we are at more than half the Quebec caucus and that assumes that Guy Caron hangs around after losing.

( if singh wins all indications are he's only interested in running in Brampton East and not any of the other open ridings or by elections )

Singh signals intent on running in Brampton East

Janice Dickson

Sunday, September 24th, 2017

NDP leadership candidate Jagmeet Singh hinted Sunday that he may want to run for the federal riding Brampton East.

“My current riding is in Bramalea-Gore-Malton, which would reflect Brampton East, that’s the riding that makes the most sense, that’s where I’ve got the history,” he said during an appearance on CTV’s Question Period.

Host Evan Solomon pressed Singh on whether he would be interested in running for Scarborough-Agincourt, which was previously held by the late Arnold Chan. Chan died Sept. 14 of cancer at the age of 50.

Singh’s victory heralds the end of the baby boomers’ reign in Canadian politics. It also brings a long-awaited sign of diversity to the federal stage.

Without Jagmeet Singh's youthful supporters, Chantal Hébert writes, the NDP might have been hard pressed to fill even the mid-sized Toronto hotel room it had chosen to hold Sunday’s leadership event.

By Chantal HébertNational Affairs Columnist

Sun., Oct. 1, 2017

With the selection of Jagmeet Singh as NDP leader, the 2019 federal leadership lineup is now complete. It will be strikingly different from that on offer only two years ago on not one but two significant scores. It will also be more representative of 21st-century Canada.

For the first time there will be someone drawn from the ranks of Canada’s visible minorities on the leaders podium.

And for the first time in the living memory of most voters, there will not be a baby boomer vying to become prime minister on behalf of one of the three main parties.

Singh is 38, the same age as Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer. At 45 Justin Trudeau is, as of now, the oldest of the three main party leaders.

The long reign of the generation that dominated Canada’s life for the past decades has drawn to an end.

There is little that is revolutionary about either change. One in five Canadians hails from a visible minority and that proportion will grow over the next decade.

In 2019 the millennials will overtake the baby boomers to become the largest cohort of Canadian voters. They already pulled their weight in the last election. By voting in greater numbers and by favouring the Liberals, they were instrumental in giving Trudeau a governing majority.

In the run-up to the leadership vote, Singh signed up the most new members but he would not have won on the first ballot without the tacit or active support of part of the NDP base. With almost 54 per cent of the vote, he finished more than 30 points ahead of runner-up Charlie Angus.

Singh did draw much support from the South Asian community. And he probably had an easier time getting his vote out because it was more concentrated than that of his rivals.

But without his supporters the NDP might have been hard pressed to fill even the mid-sized Toronto hotel room it had chosen to hold Sunday’s leadership event. And the audience would certainly have been less diverse.

It is that diversity that will likely stick in the minds of the strategists of the other parties — in particular the Liberals. The NDP will still come at them from the left, but it will offer multicultural Canada the added attraction of bringing a long-awaited element of diversity at the head of the federal table.

Singh could not be more different from Thomas Mulcair — the leader he succeeds — but they have in common that they are power-driven political figures. They both play to win.

Will Singh’s victory further damage the fragile bridge between the NDP and Quebec? To that question there is no definitive answer. But then it is not as if any of the also-rans had emerged as much of a Quebec favourite. One way or the other, Singh will have an impact in the province.

He does not hold a seat in the House of Commons and he is unfamiliar with federal politics. The first matters less than the second. Part of Mulcair’s underestimated legacy is a caucus that is more than up to the task of holding the parliamentary fort — in French and in English.

Singh already has a parliamentary leader at his disposal in the shape of Nathan Cullen, the popular British Columbia MP and former leadership contender who supported Singh’s bid.

The issues will be different, or at least the angle on them will take some getting used to. But some of the dynamics Singh encountered as a member of the Ontario legislature will be familiar. That starts with a progressive electorate whose first concern is to keep the Conservatives — be they of the Mike Harris or the Stephen Harper brand — out of power.

It also includes an incumbent who is attractive or at least not as offensive as the Conservative alternative to many left-leaning voters. On that score, Scheer has to be hoping that Singh will give Trudeau more of a run for his money, for it usually takes a divided progressive vote for the Conservatives to win power.

A word in closing: some NDP strategists had hoped it would take one more ballot to elect a leader, if only to keep the media spotlight on the attention-starved party a little while longer.

But for better or for worse for the New Democrats, Singh’s arrival on the federal scene is a story that will be more compelling for far longer than a week of leadership machinations.

What is shockingly clear is that the press seems to have formed a consensus -- Singh is their man. I think, myself, that he's the best candidate. Most people won't care about the turban anymore as soon as he gets involved in the public debate.

The NDP will try to make an 'Obama' out of him, but I think his real appeal is to 'hoser' Canada. We shall see.

The problem for the left, as I see it, is that their string has played out. Their politics is based on expanding the welfare state.

Let the media rally around Singh;
Let the millennials rally around Singh;

We often discuss that the CPC shouldn't make an effort to try and out Liberal the Liberals, but the same can be said for the Liberals trying to out NDP the NDP.

You had a leader in Mulcair that was likely as close to the center as you ever had in terms of NDP Federal Leadership and in many respects the Liberals were able to out left of the NDP on some issues and capture a lot of that support.

Now you have an NDP leader who is an NDPer;
Attacks against the Prime Minister from the left and the right for the first time since he was elected.

For the first time in this sitting of Parliament all opposition parties now have their leaders in place.

Last edited by cosmostein on Mon Oct 02, 2017 12:17 pm; edited 1 time in total

A Parliament Hill scrum is rarely the place to offer a friendly handshake — but that’s exactly how new NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh wrapped up his first scrum with press gallery reporters on Monday afternoon.

“I don’t know how you do this. How do you choose?” he said, laughing, as roughly 20 reporters lobbed questions at the 38-year-old Ontario MPP after he took in his first question period as party leader from the lobby of the House of Commons.

Singh, elected on the first ballot Sunday afternoon, was asked questions about how he plans to manage the party while he does not have a seat in the House of Commons, and when exactly he plans to seek a seat.

Singh said he has chosen an MP to lead the caucus in his stead, but did not say when he plans to name the person.

“That person’s going to be someone who can help us unify the party,” Singh said. “We have the person, we just need to work out some details and will be announcing that as soon as we can.”

Singh also brushed off suggestions that he could struggle to remain relevant without a Commons seat. He said that while he does not feel a urgent need to run for a seat, the riding he chooses to contest won’t necessarily be in the Greater Toronto Area.

“I think it’s important to have an authentic connection to the riding and there’s different places that I have an authentic connection,” he said. “You all know that I lived in St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador, for a little bit. I feel like I’ve got some Atlantic connection as well as where I grew up in Windsor and the GTA.”

To answer your question;
The ship is at least turning in the right direction, but we are not there yet.

The Liberals keep talking about "tax fairness" in place of government revenue generation.

In the 2016 budget on the back of nearly $290,000,000,000 of revenue, income splitting (to a max of 2k) went away, credits arts and sports for children went away, the TFSA amount was slashed in half

In the 2017 budget on the back of nearly $305,000,000,000 of revenue excise tax went up on alcohol, tax credits to transit users went away, tax benefits for the tourism industry went away, in the face of all this discussion about daycare the remove the benefit to employers who created on-site daycare

And now here we are marching into 2018 with this latest revenue grab.

The theme with the Government is spend spend spend;
And in a scramble to try and continue that trend every budget claws more back from citizens and adds to the Governments revenue pile.

This situation with small business is just the latest one.

In our nations history we had never spent more than $300,000,000,000 in a Federal Budget, the Government achieved that in 2016 when their budget had expenditures of about $317,000,000,000

On the same note;
In our nations history the Government has never achieve a revenue level of in excess of $300,000,000,000 which was achieved in 2017.

We have a spending problem in Ottawa.
The Federal Government has more money available to it than at anytime in our history and every passing budget they are seeking out more.

That's what I think accounts for the sag in Liberal support -- the let-downs, the confusion, the obvious policy ploys that weren't thought through ... and the taxes, of course, but more than the taxes, i think there's a growing feeling that, perhaps because of Trump's election, we zigged when we should have zagged, policy-wise.

What I am getting at is the Liberal are, as a priority, taking most of the Harper domestic programme apart, just as Trump is making his economy more competitive.

An example of the policy stew -- the Marijuana Dialogues. The Feds want to split a 10% tax on top of a basic price of $10 a gram. That would mean the usual quarter ounce would cost $70 plus a tax of $7 plus GST on $77 = $87. The provinces want a bigger bite than that.

It is only now being negotiated, so none of this is cast in stone.

Let me tell you -- this won't make the black market go away! It means that the quarter ounce that most people pay $60 for now, will cost $87 when it's legal! Do they really think this is going to work?

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